“I can bring you here.” His voice lost its steadiness. “Tell me what you want. Admit it and I’ll let you go. Lie to me and I will bring you here and give you what we both want.”
Part of me wanted to lie. I bit my lip against the thought, knowing that he knew. He laughed, a rough sound. His power built. He would come get me. He would pop me there, however he did that, and I would be in that shower with a naked, wet, hard, soapy Chance. And it would be because I lied. Because he saw in my head that I wanted him to fetch me and take me in more ways than one. That I wanted to replace his hand with my own and watch him…
I stood straighter and thought to him, as clearly and loudly as I could, I admit it. I want you. Let me go. I did not do this on purpose. Please. I am in a bar, for goodness sake. I cannot simply disappear in front of all these people.
His hand stilled, and I breathed deeply, a clean clear breath that trembled only a little as it left my lips. He did one last fast hard jerk that made us both gasp, but did not fulfill either of us.
Say it once more. Like you mean it.
He paused because I said nothing.
Please. His voice in my head edged with desire.
I want you. My own need vibrated in the words. I could not hide from him and expect him to free me. So I let him hear because he could feel it as clearly as I could see him hard with the shower water raining down on his glistening body.
He snapped the connection and I sagged in relief. I ached in unfulfilled need. I had ached for days. He had kept me in a nearly perpetual state of arousal. This had to stop. I ignored that the shower episode had been technically my fault for bad timing. Regardless of when I tried reaching toward him, timing would have sucked with Chance.
But back in the crowded bar, I caught a few curious glances. I dragged a hand through my hair and took a clean, if still ragged, breath. Although I could see the bar again, I could not see anyone I had come in with. I wove through the crowd and found my parade of strange folk. It sounded like the beginning of a joke, really. So a muse, a fairy and a witch go to a bar and then…
I found them questioning a woman wearing horn-rimmed glasses in the back of the bar. She sat beside a taller woman who had a black pool cue with skulls painted on it that she swung like a baton.
The woman with glasses smiled at Avery with adoration on her face. Her hair fell to her ass, all of it blonde, and her eyes, behind the specs, sparkled a pretty blue. She talked about her boyfriend and Frank listened with interest.
Mia filled me in.
Apparently, the woman had a boyfriend who had been one of the original victims of the Hammer this time around. Her name was Amanda, and when Avery smiled at her, she seemed simply amazed by him.
It took me a minute to realize he had used glamour on the strangers. I snagged his scrawny arm and pulled him aside. “I thought I told you no glamour when you’re up here?”
He didn’t react.
I had spoken over his head again and, in the loud bar, he had not heard a word. I growled and bent down to him. “Avery.” I spoke into his ear so he could hear me. “I thought we went over glamour.”
He smiled and his teeth flashed very white in the darkness. I had never noticed before how sharp the teeth of the fey are. A few weeks ago, Vickie and I had been watching some show about animals and predators and prey. It came back to me how a person could identify an animal as prey or predator by the set of its eyes because prey had eyes on the sides of their heads, like deer and fish. Predators had eyes set to the front. To hunt. Also predators had sharper teeth.
Most of Avery’s teeth had sharp points, not only the canines. All of them seemed to come to a point, slightly. Not human. Something Chance said crashed around me in a wave.
I am not human.
The siren part hovered as close to vampire as possible without drinking blood. And this creature smiling up at me, the representative of my mother’s people, could not pass as human. His sharp teeth, his catlike movements, and way of thinking…were distinctly not human.
I stood in a bar in the Harbor and wondered suddenly who I was. I let go of his arm and backed away.
I hit Mia in my retreat and Avery came closer to me. “Princess, I only intended to get your attention. I meant no harm. Do not fear me.”
His concern seemed wrong somehow on that alien face, and I turned to Mia. I did not fear him or the glamour. I terrified myself with my realizations. I was afraid of me. What in God’s name had I become? Suddenly, I did not care about the Hammer, or Chance or any of it. I wanted to run. If I left, maybe I could leave all of it behind. “I gotta go, Mia.” I gave her a swift hug and headed for the door.
“What are you talking about? Janie!”
She tried to catch my arm, but I easily dodged her outstretched hand. She was, as Chance had said, merely human. She may have been a witch with powers, but at the end of the day, she remained only a powerful human.
I’m not human at all.
I moved through the bar in a blur, not sure if anyone even saw me move. By the time I hit the street, I had reached full speed. Then, without warning, liquid night crashed down from the sky and landed on top of me, crushing us both to the sidewalk in a heap.
I lay breathless for a moment and I could not see. Shit, he took my eyes again.
For a moment, I really thought Chance had done something to me again. Then I realized I could see light through the stands of silky darkness that smelled like steak. I wrapped my fingers in a handful. It felt as cold as the night itself, and I tried to relearn how to breathe. The darkness had arms and weight. “Good morning, Vance.”
His lips grazed my neck and he whispered back, “Good morning. Where are you off to?”
Running from myself. I wasn’t sure how far or fast I had to go to get away from me, but I was willing to find out. “Away.”
He turned me in his arms, and I studied his lovely blue eyes while he tugged me to my feet. His hair fell around us like black water, straight and so dark it glowed nearly blue. His skin under my hands gave no warmth, even compared to the night, and I sighed. I thought of our song, Moondance, and how he had held me in his arms and danced to that song across the very air with me. Would I give up all the magic in my world for a little humanity?
That the answer was yes would probably have made him frown. The song played in my head, and I slid my hands to his face, closed my eyes, and kissed him firmly. I would fight for him. It wasn’t too late. I could still be nearly human. I could still be with him. It wasn’t too late.
He kissed me back, his lips cold and hard on mine.
I had just begun to enjoy the feel of him when Chance jerked the line between us. He filled my head and my eyes snapped open. Chance could feel Vance’s lips on mine. He could feel my vampire lover’s hands on me and my heated reaction.
His white-hot fury shot like a lance down my spine. I closed my eyes again and fought against bowing to his will. I stayed in Vance’s arms despite Chance trying to make me move away. Finally, I broke the kiss and whispered, “We’re in the street.” I did not admit even to myself that I had caved to Chance’s insistence that I stop what I was doing or else, but I did not want to know what his idea of or else was.
Vance nuzzled my neck. “I know, but I want you.”
He wanted to bite me. I read between the lines and shivered. Oh, I wanted that, too. But not with Chance in the backseat, so to speak. Get out of my head!
You want passion? Tell me which you like more, Janie.
Vance had his hands on my body. His lips grazed the siren mark. Why do guys always go for the easy spots? As if a vampire with magic lips cruising over a spot that made me go wild wasn’t enough, Chance used his power to slide his hand down my body and between my legs. He did not physically touch me but, through the connection, he might as well have.
My mouth opened and a loud moan escaped from the two eroticisms hitting me at once. Both men teased my most sensitive zones. The sensations fell this side of too much to resist.
&
nbsp; Vance glanced up from what he was doing, his eyes glowing cobalt with masculine ego and need in equal measure. “Shh, street, remember? Can I bite you, Janie?”
Tell him no, Janie. And Chance punctuated his words by pinching a very important portion of my anatomy and rubbing it harder. Tell him it is me you want.
My breath came faster, and I clutched Vance desperately. “Oh, God, yes.” I whispered out loud, and Chance hissed through my mind. The words had slipped between my lips as I rubbed my body against Vance to relieve the pressure Chance had created.
No. Don’t answer me out loud! Pay attention.
But it was too late. Vance had his fangs out and since he respected my privacy and didn’t peek into my mind, he assumed we were alone. He thought I responded to him and his touch. He did not sense the other man between us, did not feel Chance’s hands on my body and his lips that grazed that needy place between my legs.
So with Chance there, Vance pierced my skin above the siren mark. I clutched his jacket and did not have the breath to say anything. I barely had the breath to breathe. A cacophony of ecstatic shrieks filled my head. None of it made much sense, but I perched on the edge of sensory overload.
Vance’s teeth sank deep in my skin, his mouth drawing me out and tugging a line of pleasure down my body. His cool hands soothed my overheated flesh.
Chance used the tie between us to try to override vampire pleasure with his power…his control over me. He tried to persuade me to believe he offered more, that he could bring me more pleasure without even touching me physically.
The two attempts to drive me over the edge caused my spine to bow in Vance’s arm and my fingers to clench with desperation. I had no energy to do more. I had no control to respond or react or do anything clever to either of them. They had overridden all that I had in personal defense with their twin attacks, and I became a slave to the feelings. As I lost control over myself, the siren fist opened.
Suddenly Vance glowed like a light before me. I could see his life as color and I wanted that. As he drew from me, I caught my hand in his hair and began to pull his light away from him. No conscious thought made me feed off of him. It was automatic. Light equaled sustenance to my battered body.
Chance drove his mental, but oh so talented tongue, inside my body and at the same time flicked the hard nub above where his invisible mouth feasted. The light I drained from Vance shot from me to Chance and we shared the bounty. We drank my vampire and Vance drank from me and I shattered with a nearly silent cry. I had no voice for more than one soft moan of pleasure.
From down the line, Chance gave a final long, liquid lick. I sensed his satisfaction, as he demanded again, Tell me which you like more…his bite or mine?
With the energy I’d pulled from Vance, so much more powerful than a human, and that I had taken from Chance earlier, I rode on more power than I had ever taken at once. Using it, I snapped the connection that Chance had opened between us.
The aftershocks of the orgasm he had caused rocked me, and I wanted to weep. He had caused it. He had overridden the feelings Vance created and turned the experience into a feeding session. He had turned my intimate moment with another man into something between him and I. Although Vance’s arms held me and Vance’s lips continued to trace lazy patterns on my flesh, and Vance’s voice whispered in my ear, Chance had taken him nearly out of the equation.
I was truly becoming a monster. I had to be if I could out monster a vampire. I clung to Vance, and the last shred of my imagined humanity dried up and blew away in the cold night air. Even though I admitted I was not and had never been human, that did not mean I could not proceed as planned. If I was a monster, I would be the one I chose to be, not the one Chance wanted me to be. And I wanted Vance. I kissed him and slid my arm around his waist as we headed back to Brennan’s together. I had a Hammer to hunt, even if I hunted it on legs gone to rubber.
I entered the bar a new woman, so to speak. I walked to the back where everyone still sat and chatted with Amanda and her friend. Mia glanced up concerned and Avery’s eyes met mine with a hungry expression. The muse grinned at me and, out of the range of emotions, it struck me as the odd one.
I held Vance’s hand and leaned into him in the warm afterglow. Frank’s grin widened and I couldn’t resist asking, “What?”
“I thought I would tell you I like Chance. Really. He gets a bum rap, but he’s a kind soul.”
Although I had shut Chance out, I realized he had some sort of unbreakable connection in my mind somehow because I could almost see him smirk in my head. I glared at the muse. “Don’t you mean, Vance?”
Vance shifted his attention to the muse, too. “What brought Chance up?”
I sucked in a breath. Couldn’t help it. Guilty conscience.
Frank laughed merrily and everyone stared at him curiously. I had a pretty good idea why he was merry—although I couldn’t be sure he knew what I thought he knew. I did not want to know, but I was pretty darned annoyed. On the upside, no one was staring at me anymore.
“I just thought I should tell Janie that. I think sometimes she does not believe in him or herself so I thought I would mention that he has a good soul. I like him.”
Vance slid into the booth next to Mia. “I don’t like him at all.”
Frank laughed, smacking his leg in his mirth.
I did not laugh. Again, not amused by the same stuff a muse finds amusing. Altogether, I was not too impressed by the muse in general.
All of the sudden, Vance stood up as if he heard something that none of the rest of us could hear. I glanced at him and he ignored me.
“I’ll be right back.” He disappeared in one of those vampire moves too fast to track with the eye.
I shrugged it off to vampire business. Who knew what kind of vampire political issues might have arisen? He was after all the biggest dog in town. I didn’t think much of it and I took the seat he’d vacated.
Frank sat there, wrapped up in his own hilarity.
I glared at him. The theme song to Gilligan’s Island jingled over the hum of the bar, and I tugged my cell phone from my pocket. Odd Stuff’s phone number appeared on the screen. “Hey, Sven, what goes?”
“Your mom stopped by the store.”
My eyebrows rose. The muse smacked the table and laughed so hard, I wondered if he was going to have to use the bathroom.
“She says she wants to talk to you and Avery when you get in. Since I was going to go out for a while, do you want me to leave her here with Vickie and you can catch her when you get home?”
I passed along the message to Mia and she shrugged.
“Can I talk to her?”
He put my mom on.
“Janie?”
“We won’t be back for a while, Mom. Are you sure you want to wait?”
“Not a problem. I have some things I wanted to do anyway.”
Glancing again to Mia, I put my hand over the receiver. “Can she do anything to the store?”
“Nah.”
“I can hear you.” My mother’s fingers tapped the closest surface irritably.
“Um, well, yeah, thanks, Mom. That would be great.”
She hung up on me and I shrugged. Whatever she wanted to talk about was going to make me mad anyway, so angering her was probably proactive on my part. I turned back to Mia. “Sven said he had something to do. He’s leaving Vickie with Mom. Maybe he’ll stop in here.”
Frank chuckled.
I glared at him and slid from the booth. “I’m going to get a drink.”
Frank wiped a tear from his eye. He seemed to be coming to the end of his private joke. “Mia, I really must visit you more often. You have the most fascinating friends. I so enjoy playing in your pool.”
“You’re messing with all of us, aren’t you?”
He smiled up at me. “I am muse. I am inspiration. I can no more help what I am than you can help…” He quirked that blond brow at me and the expression said to me, in a word, Chance.
“You
r siren stuff.” Mia spun a straw around in the drink in front of her oblivious to the silent battle between Frank and I.
I glanced at the muse one last time before going to get a Corona. Something told me neither he nor I were thinking of siren stuff. Jerk.
I moved to the front of the bar to order my drink. I had just paid for the beer when a flash of red out the window caught my eye. Julia? I moved to the bay windows at the front of the bar to peer into the night. Beyond the green letters spelling Brennan’s in curvy script backwards, I could just see the night beyond. And on the street, stood Julia.
I turned and moved to put my drink back on the bar and nearly hit Frank.
“Are you following me now, too?”
“Tonight I am. Things are about to get interesting.”
I so did not want to know what he considered interesting. I placed my drink on the bar and turned as the entire gang lined up behind me. Great, an entourage of strange folk.
I left the bar, trailed by a witch, a muse, and a fairy. We were a silent group. Well, mostly. Frank giggled. I glared at him and he shut up.
When I turned back around, I hit a mountain. “Sven?” I gasped as he caught me, barely keeping me from falling.
“Sorry, Janie,” he mumbled and did not meet my eyes. “Hey, I gotta go. Nice seeing you, though. Things to do!” With that, our gentle giant practically shoved me out of his way and hustled down the street, trailing a pink scarf in his wake.
Mia and I stared at each other and she shrugged. “Maybe he’s seeing someone?”
I grinned. “Maybe…” I tried to picture Sven’s idea of a good date and came up blank. I headed back in the direction I had seen Julia go and found her. She was, of course, standing behind Vance.
My power came online in a white-hot rush.
Vance crouched in front of Julia in a defensive position. Julia stood behind him, not cowering like a weak female, but like she was casting. They faced off with a dark haired man…who stood there leering?
I shut the power down as quickly as I had brought it online. When the air popped and hissed as it shifted, I did not even spare a glance at Chance.
Frank clapped his hands. “Well, the gang’s all here.”
Odd Melody (Odd Series Book 2) Page 15